Columbia officials to use other cities for public transportation examples

Officials from around Columbia will travel to out-of-state to explore revisions to the city's transportation system.

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University of Missouri students, city officials and MU’s transit consultant will visit Ames, Iowa to look at their public transportation system on Friday (Feb. 17).

Columbia City Manager Mike Matthes says this trip will explore Iowa’s public transportation system and how Columbia can implement some of their tactics.

“Well the idea behind the trip really is to go and see for ourselves what these other organizations, communities and universities have done with their transit needs. And so, no better way to figure that out than field research,” Matthes said.

Both the city and the university have created groups to investigate Columbia’s issues dealing with lack of funding, route cuts and low ridership. The group will also travel to Lawrence, Ks. and Champaign, Ill. later in the month to look at how their transportation systems work.